Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1887-03-26
THF REIGN OF A GOOD QUEEN.

THF REIGN OF A GOOD QUEEN
The great jubilee which is being
arranged to celebrate the fiftieth
anniversary of Queen Victoria's
reign calls attention to tremen-
dous period of the worlds history.
The fifty years between 1887 and 1887
have seen vast changes in every
nation. In Great Britain progress
and civilization have been pushed
onward in the sturdy English way
until the United Kingdom has @
population ofover thirty six millions,
a wealth of between forty and fifty
Thousand million dollars, a shipping
tonnage of nine millions, standing
army of 100000, an armament that
costs S132,000,00O annually, and
other possessions in proportion.
Queen Victoria's reign has been that
of moral mediocrity, Of steady
growth rather than Of brilliant
splurges. 1t has few, if any, of the
great events of history. In war the
period has been remarkably tame.
An Indian mutiny was quelled. a
Russian fortress was destroyed,
few African kings were whipped
into dependence, Arab was exiled,
Egypt was bankrnpted, and Gordon
was murdered. The kingdom rose
to the commercial supremacy of the
world under Victoria's rule. but last
year the foreign trading was over
Two hundred million dollars below
that Of 1884, and four hundred and
fifty millions below that of 1883, and
it looks as If in this respect the king
dom is slipping rapidly backward.
1t was an era of strong men. The
brilliant Disraell played his dazzling
part, and quit the stage mourned by
millions of jealous followers. The
powerful Gladstone impressed his
marvellous ability upon the age, and
his usefulness yet remains. Just
now Salisbury is trying to keep to-
gether a restless cabinet, and Par
nell is the splendid leader of a right
eous cause. In literature there are
many immortal names; in poetry,
Wordsworth, Coleridge, Elizabeth
Barrett Browning, Alfred TennysoD,
George Macdonald, Robert Brown
ing in essays, Thomas Carlyle, John
Ruskin, John Morley; IN history,
Macaulay, Freeman, Green; in
science, Darwin, Huxley, Wallace,
Simpson, Herschell. Lyell; in religi
Gus prose, Cardinal Newman, Dean
Stanley, F. W. Robertson and James
Martineau; in fiction, everybody's
friend, Dickens and Thackeray.
George Eliot" Charles Kingsley,
Charlotte Bronte, Charles Reade,
Robert Buchanan, the author OF
"John Halifax" and Robert Louis
Stevenson; in journalism, Russell,
Sala, Forbes, Stead, Delene, Walter
and Labouchere. 1t was an age of
novels and an era Of newspapers.
More fiction was Published than dur
ing all the previous history Of the
kingdom. AS for newspapers, the
growth was phenomenal. In 1921
the presses Of the kingdom produc,
ed annually 21,OOO,O papers; now
single weekly prints 304,000,0OO
copies yearly, and the penny dailies
average million copies, while the
monthly magazines have an annual
production of 100000 copies.
In politics the period has been
turbulent, but not particularly bril-
liant. The new law entranchised
thousands of voters in England, but
many excellent measures of reform
have failed. After all, however,
how much better and more glorious
! this jubilee would be if it carried to
Ireland some recompense for the
centuries of brutality, and gave to
the Irish people freedom from op-
preston and the right to govern
4 themselves american.